Mike Hourahine

I would argue that Apple’s restrictive policies on iPhone development have actually helped it’s ecosystem to grow to be vibrant and incredibly useful.  I still maintain that the iPhone is the most useful piece of electronics ever made.  Apple’s controversial policies has alot of the cruft out the of App store and helped maintain a very focussed user experience on the iPhone.  I don’t think those policieis will have the same positive effect on the iPad in the long run. Here’s why:

The iPhone is an on-the-go device, meaning, in general, one is using it while moving, waiting or generally in the middle of something else.  Therefore, you are happy that functionality is purposely kept relatively limited because, despite the thousands of apps available, you only actually want it to do a few things and whatever it does you want it to be simple and fast.

With the iPad on the other hand, because of its larger screen, you inherently want to do more with it, spend more time o on it.  You want to be able to get at more of it, find more uses for it, and perhaps even (*gasp*) customize it like you do your desktop.  I think, over time, it will be less about the focused user experience (which Apple has done tremendously with the iPhone) and more about what you can do with it.  I’d argue this is quite different from the iPhone and yet, for all intents and purposes, the iPad is treated as the same device as the iPhone (iOS, App store, APIs, policies, etc.).  There will be tremendous market pressure from Android, Playbook and other tablet ecosystems for Apple to allow the iPad to do more.  Because of this, Apple will have to work alot harder to maintain its market share in the tablet space.

Perhaps one day you’ll even be able to see a file on your iPad… fat chance of that one.

A few months ago, Wired’s cover story was The Web is Dead, Long Live the Internet.  The headline was a tad overreaching but the basic idea was that browser based applications are on the decline while native applications (applications built specifically for a platform, like a Mac email application vs. Gmail) are on the rise.  The initial thought made me uneasy because I enjoy the ubiquity of web-based applications, how they aren’t tied to a given computer, device or operating system and that you can get at your stuff from literally any computer.  I also personally enjoy web development and don’t want to see it go away any time soon.

Recently, because of the slick user experience many of them offer combined with the inherent challenges / limitations of web development, I’ve been more and more drawn to native apps.   I never use Twitter’s website, opting for native apps on the iPhone or the Mac.  I prefer Facebook’s iPhone app over their horrible web user interface.  I never even think of using Evernote’s web interface (does anyone even know it exists?).  I’m starting to like Outpost over Basecamp’s web interface.  Today I even installed Sparrow, a native mac gmail client, and I have to say I’m liking the experience so far despite having always loved Gmail.

Why is this?  Native apps are less cluttered, usually faster, don’t get mixed up with a million other tabs I have open in my web browser and overall “feel” nicer to use.  Will it always be this way for me?  I doubt it.  I change what I work with constantly and get bored easily.  There is also signficant work being done to improve the web experience with projects like Sproutcore.

But the pendulum continues to swing between native and web, rich and thin client, centralized / decentralized and will continue to swing, I’m certain, indefinitely…

I’ve been supposedly “maintaining” this site for as long as blogs have been around and it’s gone through many revisions.  Truth be told, however, I really don’t put any effort into it.  I always have the best intentions of sharing my thoughts, what I’m working on, where I’m heading with my work, etc.  However, I never put a priority on sharing.  I’m always to eager to move onto the next thing rather than take the time and reflect.  I also struggle with trying to include every thought I ever had on a particular subject rather than picking one small aspect of it to focus.  Maybe it has something to do with how my brain tries to connect everything together all time.  Hazards of a working in technology I suppose…

So for a while now, I simplified – I’ve just shown my Twitter, Delicious and Flickr feeds, things I update every day through the regular course of my work.  But not everything fits in those boxes and I do want this site to be a place you can come and learn about me (the professional side of me anyways).  So here I go again… this time I’m going to try short bursts, tumbelog style.  Things that don’t quite fit into 140 characters… Hopefully, I can get more thoughts out there this way.